Samuel Edgar, 1905-1974
The couple in this image are Samuel and Mary “Minnie” Edgar, maternal Grandparents of my first husband. It was on this day in 1905 in Drumaness, County Down, Northern Ireland that Samuel Edgar was born – the youngest of 7 children to John Edgar and Ellen Neill.
Click on image to enlarge
These images are a treasure to me since they were only acquired in the last year and I have been searching for any information on this family since divorcing from my first husband in 1996. His parents had been most co-operative with me in providing what information they could on their families to aid my research and information on his father’s line came quite quickly in comparison to this line which was made all the more trickier in that his mother came from Ireland and could only provide scant information on family names but seeing my progress on his father’s line was encouraging to her and she was very keen to find out as much as I could on her line also. I had warned her how difficult it might be to find anything but never gave up and re-visited my searches for them time and time again suddenly having all the information I wanted open up to me last year with the advancement of Irish records being made more readily available and a chance (or “miraculous” as I choose to view it) connection with another descendant on Mary’s side named Rita Wilde who had this image of Samuel and Mary and was able to confirm a lot of the information I was searching for.
Sadly the information came too late for me to share with my former mother-in-law as she passed away herself last year but I know she would have been thrilled and excited to see the 4 further generations of this branch I have since discovered. I love Samuel’s headstone which is shared with one of his sons of the same name – I think he might have a love of pigeons somehow!
(Headstone for Samuel and Sammy Edgar in Roselawn Cemetery, Belfast, Antrim, Northern Ireland)
The greatest satisfaction comes in knowing that our children now have information on both sides of their family tree even if they don’t quite appreciate the significance of that yet. There will come a time when them or the generations that follow after them will be thankful I never gave up.
